4 months ago

4 months ago

4 months ago

The up-and-down nature of Georgetown’s season is enough to give people vertigo. Let’s recap. The Hoyas went into Big East play at 8-3 with a good, not great, non-conference resume. A month later, Georgetown would lose five straight conference games, dropping their overall record to 11-9 (3-6 Big East), clearly listing, and headed into a seemingly unwinnable match-up agasinst Big Ten leader and Final Four contender Michigan State. John Thompson III miraculously found a way to beat the Spartans a couple of Saturdays ago, and since then has led the Hoyas to wins in their next three games. Fast forwarding to today, the Hoyas are back to .500 in conference play and hanging around the “Last Four Out” line of the NCAA Tournament according to ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi. Their latest win, an 83-72 home victory against Providence on Monday, was the first step in a crucial streak of four games where they’ll need to come away with victories in order to seal a bid on Selection Sunday.

Trawick’s Return is Huge for the Hoyas

The Hoyas are coming up on a crucial stretch of games which will make or break their season. These games are at St. John’s, at Seton Hall, Xavier and at Marquette. All four teams are middle-of-the pack conference foes and, it’s also probably worth mentioning, these are three of the four same teams that already defeated Georgetown in their January five-game skid. If the Hoyas want to prove to the selection committee that they have indeed turned a corner, they are going to need to win most of these games. The road to redemption began on Monday night in DC when Georgetown’s offense went off on Providence and the defense withstood an outstanding shooting night from Bryce Cotton, who scored 31 points on 14 shots. It was only last month that Georgetown had lost to the Friars for the first time since 2005. A second half run by the Friars marked the beginning of the Hoyas’ skid – which was further compounded by Joshua Smith’s academic issues becoming permanent and Jabril Trawick’s absence for a few games due to a broken jaw. But with Trawick now back and the big win over Providence boosting the Hoyas’ confidence, Georgetown will look to exact revenge at the same time as trying to save their season.

It can’t be overstated just how important these next two weeks are for JTIII’s team. The four rivals are in similar positions and are looking to distinguish themselves from the middle tier in the Big East. Georgetown’s offense has steadily improved throughout the last four games, and they’ve managed fewer than seven turnovers in their last three games. They’ve seemed to finally figure out the offense without Smith and will need to keep this cohesion going throughout this important stretch. Next up: a surging St. John’s team that was also left for dead in January. The Big East drama is heating up and looks to continue simmering for the remainder of the regular season.